SERIES: PRESCRIPTIONS FOR A HEALTHY & HOLY CHURCH:
A Study in 1 Corinthians Applied To The Church Today
II. DEALING WITH OBVIOUS DISEASES
A. CANCER
“SOURCE FOR A CURE” (1 Cor. 2:6-16)
Rev. Todd G. Leupold, Perth Bible Church, February 1, 2009 AM
INTRODUCTION:
I doubt that there are any of us who would deny that CANCER is one of the great menaces of our society – and has been for a long, long time. In fact, I recently read that cancer is expected soon to surpass heart disease as the #1 killer in the world! For decades, the world has spent billions and billions of dollars on researching a cure. For decades, the world’s best and brightest minds have been working together in an attempt to find an effective cure. Throughout this time, countless educated and creative theories and experiments have been conducted to this end. And, yet, people keep contracting, suffering and dying from various forms of cancer.
But, what if it didn’t HAVE to be this way? What if there really was a cure? Would anyone with cancer hesitate to use it? Would anyone hesitate to administer it to a loved one with cancer?
In the past few weeks we have seen how even the Church, as the spiritual Body of Christ on earth, can be subject to spiritual cancer – an out-of-control and often unnoticed multiplication of unhealthy cells. We’ve also seen how human treatments – even by the most intelligent and well-meaning people, even when creative, even when worked at relentlessly – are extremely limited in their effectiveness.
However, Scripture tells us that there is indeed a cure for killing cancer in the Church!
SCRIPTURE: 1 CORINTHIANS 2:6-16
I.) THE NATURE OF THE CURE (2:6-10a)
The cure is discoverable, but not according to the wisdom of men that the early Corinthian Christians were so pursuing and proud of. And, that so many of us today continue to pursue and take pride in.
Just previous to this, Paul – inspired by the Holy Spirit – focused on salvation through Christ crucified as the proper form for true wisdom. Now, in these verses before us, he focuses on the content and nature of true wisdom – a wisdom that provides the cure for spiritual cancer!
As such, there is nothing about it that is natural, obvious, or obtainable by any earthly means.
It is:
A.) HIDDEN WISDOM
From the beginning of time and creation, such wisdom has been hidden from all men. That is, until this time (the 1st Century), when it was revealed through Christ and Scripture. Even so, while it has now been revealed and made discoverable, it’s unexpected nature keeps it hidden from most – especially the elite who limit where they will look.
This is still so true today, when the vast majority of our leaders, scientists and teachers insist on narrowing their studies and theories ONLY to what can be explained through natural causes.
B.) MYSTERY
A mystery, by definition (and certainly in Biblical usage) is something which is not easily understood, but that will eventually be revealed to those who search and wait.
Think about it. How interesting do you think it would be if Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote his Sherlock Holmes stories such that Holmes never explains what had been a mystery? What if the books simply ended with Holmes declaring “I know what happened,” THE END?
Similarly, God has wrapped the cure to spiritual cancer within a mystery in order that those who shared His passion would continue to listen until it is revealed.
C.) PRE-DETERMINED
Not only was the existence of this cure present since the beginning of time, but God’s desire and plan to reveal it to us was as well.
D.) NOW SPECIALLY REVEALED
Most of exciting of all, He pre-determined this for OUR glory!!! The only way, however, for us to receive glory is through the grace of “the Lord of glory” – Jesus Christ.
Thus, this predetermined hidden mystery is our salvation through Jesus Christ by grace through faith! In the light and position of such salvation, THEN we may be able to understand His wisdom and, with it, the cure to our spiritual cancer.
For God to give it otherwise would be akin to what Jesus was talking about when He cautioned the disciples not to throw pearls to swine (Mt. 7:6). You certainly could give it to them, but they would never be able to understand or appreciate what it truly is and would, instead, inevitably attack and destroy it.
II.) THE TEACHER OF THE CURE (2:10b-13)
There is only ONE who possesses and can teach us this priceless cure, and that is God.
God, however, thinks, moves and communicates on the spiritual realm. Therefore, to be taught by Him and receive His care in a manner which is properly understood and thus effective, is only possible for those who can understand His mind and Words as expressed from spirit to spirit.
To try to understand God’s ways according to natural human thinking is akin to believing that an earthworm can effectively hear and understand your vocal communication. It’s impossible!
Only spirit can understand spirit as communicated through a spiritual ’link.’
Thus, it was necessary that this be ’hidden’ and kept a ’mystery’ until Christ entered the world as the incarnate Messiah, offered Himself as a perfect sacrifice for our sins, and rose in ultimate victory over sin and death.
Through salvation in Christ, the once-dead spirit of the saved is similarly resurrected and that person is ’born again’ – this time as a spiritual, rather than simply ’natural’ person.
Thus saved and regenerated in spirit, the redeemed truly may hear & understand the wisdom of God to cure that which confounds the so-called wisdom of men.
III.) THE QUALIFICATIONS OF THE EFFECTIVE HEALER (14-16)
A.) MUST NOT BE NATURAL, BUT SPIRITUAL
The natural person, who does not have a regenerated spirit in Christ, is incapable of hearing or understanding God’s wisdom and Truth.
In fact, not only are they incapable, but they will presume it to be preposterous, nonsensical, impossible and worthless.
Nothing illustrates this better then people’s response to the cross of Christ.
Only the spiritual can be effective healers!
The spiritual person, in openness and dependence upon Christ and His wisdom, can then properly understand BOTH the natural and the spiritual. The natural person, however, can NEVER understand anything of the spiritual.
To believe otherwise is to believe that one is capable of teaching God Himself. Absurd!
B.) MUST HAVE THE MIND OF CHRIST
So, why is it then, that not all Christians understand the wisdom of God?
Because, while all Christians have the ability to hear, understand, and apply the supreme wisdom of God not all choose to seek or follow it!
Simply being a Christian by grace through faith in Christ as our Lord and Savior merely makes it possible to know, understand and live in the wisdom of God.
To use an analogy, salvation only opens the door to God’s University of True Wisdom. It remains up to each of us to choose to attend His classes, study His teachings, follow His mentors, and pass His exams by fully and correctly applying what we have learned.
That is what it means to ’have the mind of Christ.’ Only then and to that extent will we attain the wisdom of God that is the cure to what ails us and those around us!
CONCLUSION: CLAIMING THE CURE
Dr. Ironside once explained it like this:
“...the Holy Spirit has come to dwell in us, and it is through Him that we do the searching and the studying, and the Spirit of God opens the truth of God to us. People say, ’I do not know how it is that some folks get such wonderful things out of their Bibles. I do not get them out of mine. . . ’ I will tell you why. It is because you do not sit down over your Bible in a self-judged, broken spirit, putting out of your life everything carnal, everything worldly, everything unholy, and then depending absolutely on the Holy Spirit who dwells within you to search into the Scriptures for you, to open the truth of God to you. God has given you the Holy Spirit for that very purpose.”
(First Epistle to The Corinthians, pp. 97-98).
Dr. Gordon Fee further cautions:
“As those who possess the Spirit the Corinthians also potentially possess that same mind. However . . . their behavior betrays them. They do, but they don’t. The concern from here on will be to force them to acknowledge the folly of their ’wisdom,’ which is expressing itself in quarrels and thereby destroying the very church for which Christ died. . . Paul’s concern needs to be resurrected throughout the church. The gift of the Spirit does not lead to special status among believers; rather, it leads to special status vis-a-vis the world. But it should do so always in terms of the centrality of the message of our crucified/
risen Savior. The Spirit should identify God’s people in such a way that their values and worldview are radically different from the wisdom of this age. . . Being spiritual does not lead to elitism; it leads to a deeper understanding of God’s profound mystery – redemption through a crucified Messiah.”
(The First Epistle to the Corinthians, NICNT, pg. 120).
TRANSITION TO COMMUNION:
Have you received salvation through faith in Christ and experienced new life in the Spirit?
Has your attitude, thoughts and behavior – in and out of the church – been what seems right according to worldly wisdom or God’s wisdom revealed through Scripture?
Are you making the most of Christ’s sacrifice and salvation by humbly getting all you can from Him or are you wasting it like a student who goes to an expensive private college who doesn’t bother to go to class or study except when he feels like it or thinks he has to?
